HIS TEEN PATIENT'S BIZARRE REQUEST:
Make me look like an alien
PLASTIC SURGEON WOFFLES WU AMONG 19 TOP DOCTORS
By Ng Wan Ching
June 21, 2005
A 19-YEAR-OLD girl desperately wanted to look like an alien with square eyes, an enlarged head, fairy-like ears, a sloped brow, pointed nose and narrower cheek bones.
A short overweight dark-skinned man with a South Indian face wanted to look like Brad Pitt.
These are just some of the more bizzare requests he has received as a plastic surgeon.
You can read about Dr Woffles Wu in a new hardcover book, Aesthetic Surgery, which will hit the shops here soon.
He is the only Singaporean in this book about 19 top surgeons from around the world.
Said Dr Wu, a consultant plastic surgeon at Camden Medical Centre: 'It's a wonderful honour to be recognised as one of the most famous aesthetic surgeons in the world.
'It vindicates all the hard work and travel I have put in this last decade, and justifies all the innovations and modifications I came up with.'
Japanese surgeon Dr Keizo Fukuta is the only other Asian featured in this book.
Edited by Dr Angelika Taschen, who read art history and literature, and co-written by cultural and literary historian Prof Sander Gilman of Emory University and art critic Jurgen Muller, Aesthetic Surgery is a 'lifestyle publication' by the publishing house Taschen.
Started as a little comic book shop in Cologne 25 years ago, Taschen has made a name for itself with books about art, fashion and design, and flagship stores in Paris and Los Angeles.
Its artistic heritage shows in this book about aesthetic surgery.
From liposuction to lip implants, this book explores all the ins and outs of body sculpting through photographs, illustrations, essays, and interviews.
It covers the history of aesthetic surgery (with previously unpublished medical photos); the latest methods used; before-and-after photos of transformed body parts and surgery in movies.
The surgeons chosen are known for bringing an artistic dimension to their work.
SNIP
About patients making unusual requests, Dr Wu said he sent the alien-wish girl to a psychiatrist to find out what was bothering her.
As for the South Indian Brad Pitt wannabe, Dr Wu told him it was impossible and sent him away.
The next day the man appeared again in his clinic, having lightened the colour of his skin with make-up and wearing a blond wig.
'I refused to work on him,' said Dr Wu.